Chapter 17
After a moment, he spoke.
“I think it’s better if you come back to my house.”
“What do you mean?”
“You.”
Scarlett furrowed her brows at Viktor’s words.
“Me? Why?”
“Why? Look at how you’re living.”
Viktor gestured toward her workbench, and Scarlett paused. Then she looked up at him and asked,
“Do I look unhappier now than when I lived with you?”
“Is that even a question? Do you really think life here can be compared to my house?”
“I was unhappy when I was in the Dümfelt family!”
Scarlett, who was usually calm, suddenly raised her voice, and Viktor frowned as he replied,
“You said you were happy.”
“I was happy because I had someone I loved. Attending daily parties or luncheons with someone I didn’t care for, pretending to be fine in front of people who subtly ignored me from A to Z… that wasn’t happiness at all. Even in our marriage, I was always the one clinging, and you…”
Viktor’s expression tightened at her words.
“Are you saying I didn’t make any effort?”
“Is that what you call effort?”
“I think I tried enough.”
“You call it effort to try to turn a defective product like me into a wife you can proudly introduce to others?”
Scarlett’s voice trembled with grief, and Viktor remained silent for a moment.
The light made it hard to see his face clearly, but he seemed unable to accept that Scarlett found more happiness here, dealing with tiny components barely visible without a magnifying glass, than living the lavish life in the Dümfelt household.
“Why is that?”
“……”
“Fine, you say I was lacking, so you tried to make me meet your standards. To improve me. Isn’t that effort?”
At that, Scarlett looked at him helplessly, then closed her mouth without another word.
Hearing it in his dry voice—that she was a defective product—sapped all her motivation. Convincing someone as self-centered as him that she could be loved as she was seemed impossible.
“……”
“……”
Silence stretched between them.
Since she didn’t respond, Viktor remained quiet as well.
Finally, looking up at him as he leisurely watched her, Scarlett spoke first.
“Any other questions?”
“The street lamps’ light comes through the window by your bed.”
“I know.”
“And yet, you like it here more?”
“Yes.”
For Viktor, who had lived in a mansion surrounded by vast gardens, the idea of hearing street noise or seeing lights spill indoors was probably unimaginable.
Scarlett looked toward the window and said,
“I always feel uneasy meeting strangers. Here, even guests are welcomed by Andrei, who is staff, so it’s better.”
“Then you should have told me.”
“How could I?”
Scarlett let out a hollow laugh and buried her head in the sofa.
“You told me I only need to do one thing: help you succeed. How could I say I can’t even do that one thing?”
In the early days of their marriage, the gatherings of nobles terrified her so much she couldn’t sleep. On such nights, she would curl up on the bed, hugging her knees, shivering, and waiting for dawn.
She spoke again.
“Can you just leave? You make me uncomfortable.”
“I’m not a stranger.”
“Nor are you a warm person.”
Scarlett pulled her knees up onto the armchair, buried her face, and murmured,
“And certainly not someone I love.”
Curled up like that for a long time, she eventually heard Viktor’s footsteps recede.
“……”
The wooden door creaked, and she could hear him descending the stairs.
As soon as he left, Scarlett got off the chair.
If even one cog in a clock was misaligned, it wouldn’t run. Perhaps from habit, she recently felt extreme stress whenever something was out of place. She tried to push the armchair back into position, but it wouldn’t budge, and she sighed.
“How did he move this?”
Since the day she returned from the interrogation, Scarlett had occasionally experienced memory lapses, sometimes lasting days.
She had to endure the terror alone. The precariousness only intensified her compulsions. Unable to bear it, she ran down the stairs and, for the first time, felt grateful that Viktor was a heavy smoker.
Scarlett grabbed Viktor’s coat just as he smoked outside the shop.
“Put the chair back where it belongs.”
Viktor, cigarette in mouth, turned at her words.
Trying to steady her ragged breath, Scarlett continued,
“The chair. You moved it—put it back. Don’t touch my daily life. Don’t try to fix anything!”
“Scarlett Dümfelt.”
Why does he call me Dümfelt? I’m Crimson. I make clocks using the Crimson family’s techniques.
She wanted to say that but couldn’t.
Anxiety consumed her.
Viktor dropped the cigarette and wrapped his arms around her as she almost collapsed to the ground.
Struggling to breathe in his embrace, she drew in large breaths, and Viktor lifted her, stroking her back.
“……Not even a sailor.”
Clicking his tongue at the panic symptoms his men often showed, he carried her upstairs, seated her on the bed, and returned the chair to its place.
Scarlett, too exhausted to sit, collapsed to her side, watching Viktor put the chair back.
Half-conscious, half-asleep, she murmured,
“I’ll never live with you again. So don’t ever appear in front of me, ever again.”
Too tired to read his expression, she weakly muttered,
“I’ll kill you… if you show up…”
Then she fell asleep as if she had fainted.
Viktor stood over her for a while, expressionless, staring down at her.
When the alarm rang, Scarlett awoke to find the curtains drawn—apparently, the streetlights had been disturbing her.
“Oh, no…”
Still groggy, she felt her blood drain as she pressed her hands to her forehead.
“Threatening Viktor Dümfelt with murder…”
Pale, she first opened the curtains.
Only when the soft dawn light filled the room did she notice the secret safe had been opened. She ran to it in a panic.
Inside, she discovered some of her drawn plans were missing—all biplane blueprints. Even the miniatures she had built were gone. During the panic when she fell asleep, someone had taken the evidence.
Sitting in front of the open safe, her face turned ghostly white.
If people condemned the tram as demonic, airplanes were beyond doubt. The king had said nothing should fly above his head. Being caught with biplane plans was a death sentence.
Scarlett closed the safe and buried her face in her hands.
She had been careless, thinking he overlooked tram repairs out of some lingering affection for his ex-wife.
The only lingering feelings he had for her were toward her pretending to feel nothing. His letting the tram repairs slide was just bait to catch a bigger prize.
